04/18/2012

Levon Helm, Ted Nugent and a great Michael Jordan commercial

Good morning!

The Band's drummer, Levon Helm, has reached the final stages of his battle with cancer. His wife and daughter posted a note on his website asking fans to send "prayers and love to him as he makes his way through this part of his journey." Helm, 71, was diagnosed with throat cancer in 1998, but continued to sing and perform on albums and at concerts.

Helm is one of four children of an Arkansas cotton farmer. His family loved music and often traveled to see shows. Levon wrote in his 1993 autobiograpy, This Wheel's On Fire, about seeing his first live show featuring Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys at 6. "This really tattooed my brain. I've never forgotten it," he wrote. Levon's father bought him his first guitar at age nine. He didn't pick up the drums until years later, after seeing Elvis perform with D.J. Fontana on drums. Helm thought it was the best band he has ever seen. He took up the drums a couple of years later, and performed for several years with Ronnie Hawkins, formed his own band for awhile and eventually was approached by Bob Dylan to help him "go electric." Dylan fans didn't buy into it, but the band took up residence in a large, pink house in Woodstock. Residents called them The Band, which released its first album in 1968, Music from the Big Pink. The rest, as they say, is history.

Warren Buffett has revealed that he has been diagnosed with prostate cancer. In a letter to Berkshire shareholders, the 81-year-old chairman and CEO says it's stage 1 and he will commence daily radiation treatments in July. He writes that the diagnosis is "not remotely life-threatening or even debilitating in any meaningful way." The American Cancer Society says the 5-year survival rate for stage 1 prostate cancer is 100%.

Ted Nugent's anti-Obama comments at the National Rifle Association convention have caused a stir on Twitter. "If Barack Obama becomes the president in November again, I will be dead or in jail," the rock star said. "We need to ride into that battlefield and chop their heads off in November. Any questions?" Nugent officially endorsed Mitt Romney last month on Twitter. He took to Twitter again overnight to respond to the criticism over his remarks: "Again the soulless subhumans are in a tizzy over too much truth & logic from an actual we the people loving American. Turning up the heat."

It's National Stalking Awareness Day in the U.K., but it's a trending topic worldwide on Twitter. Statistics show that 1 in 5 women and 1 in 10 men will be stalked at some point in their lives. You can learn more about stalkers and their victims at http://www.ncvc.org/.

Forgetting Sarah Marshall is trending because the Tribeca Film Festival opens tonight with the world premiere of the romantic comedy, The Five-Year Engagement. The team that made the movie is the same one behind the 2008 hit Forgetting Sarah Marshall. 90 feature films will be show on screens around the City during the festival, culminating with the world premiere of The Avengers.

Singer-songwriter Gavin DeGraw has made his exit from Dancing With The Stars. The exit is not all that surprising as he found himself among the final two every week of the season except for one.

A new video to promote the upcoming Ridley Scott movie Prometheus has gone viral.

This kid is 14 and wants to be the next movie guy announcer. Hollywood should be calling shortly.

One of the best commercials that Michael Jordan has ever done has over one million views.

Strangest video of the day belongs to this young man who demonstrates how he eats pizza.

Finally, who needs a high-tech device to wake up when you could have the cat alarm clock.